India’s Smartphone Market And Huge Subscriber Base Is A Blessing For TrueCaller

TrueCaller, an aggregator of Contact Details across the world, has revealed that India is by far its largest market.

Cross–platform Caller Line Identification Application TrueCaller, despite originating in Sweden, has found highest adoption rate in India. The company’s founders, Alan Mamedi and Nami Zarringhalam however, claim to have realized the potential of this country a long time ago. Their justification is the fact that one of the earliest releases of the app supported Nokia’s now–discontinued smartphone Operating System Symbian. Nokia, as a company enjoyed its highest customer base in India.

Just how popular is this startup? TrueCaller has a User Base exceeding 40 Million across the world. But India alone constitutes more than 50% of the user base. TrueCaller has over 22 Million users in India. Interestingly, only 25% of the users use the application in a Smartphone.

TrueCaller’s potential as a platform and as a business was recently reaffirmed by Venture Capital (VC) firm Sequoia Capital India, who invested US$ 18.8 Million within the startup. Shailesh Lakhani, Principal at Sequoia Capital India, who has joined Truecaller’s board, was all praises for the company when he said,

“Truecaller is among the most engaging applications in many high growth smartphone markets, as it helps make users more efficient in avoiding spam calls and know who is calling them. We are excited to help support the company’s growing user community,”

Coincidentally, TrueCaller has been in discussion with Sequoia’s India operations since 2012 and going by the numbers, the VC firm quipped, “You’re not a Swedish startup. You’re an Indian startup,”

The promise of a rapid rise that India offers is hard to beat. For quite some time companies have been enamored by this country. A few like Nimbuzz even relocated their headquarters to India proving that India has the best potential as far as Mobile Ecosystem and its associated technologies are concerned.

TrueCaller has been focusing on enhancing the Identification of Unknow Callers, a phenomenon rising rapidly due to the sheer number of mobile subscribers. The company tied–up with Innoz to offer SMS based query of the Mobile Number and even established a relation with Twitter to look–up Numbers that might be linked to the micro–blogging network.

With such a focused approach to solve a very elementary need of awareness, it’s no wonder TrueCaller has gained acceptance. What do you think?